“No,” I said.
The girl took my shoulder. “Don’t move.”
Frozen by her command, I expected the terrorist to raise his gun and fire. But he walked past us—through us, as if we were smoke and mist.
I turned and watched him recede into the cloud. His passage swirled the gray behind him, clearing a column of air. I saw plastic chairs and television screens and bodies lying on the floor.
“This is the airport,” I murmured.
The girl frowned. “Of course it is.”
“But why—”
Inside the swirling clouds something flashed, a metal cylinder clattering along the floor toward us. The size of a soft drink can, it rolled to a stop a few yards away, spinning and hissing, spraying more smoke into the air. In seconds the clear passage that the gunman had created filled with mist again.
“Tear gas,” I murmured. This wasn’t heaven. It was a battle zone.
Security is responding, the woman on the phone had said. I finally realized that the roaring sound was gunfire, muted by distance or whatever had gone wrong with my senses.
“Don’t worry,” the girl said. “Nothing can hurt you here.”
I turned to her. “Where’s here? None of this makes sense!”
“Try to pay attention,” she said, exasperated now. “You’ve thought your way into the afterworld, and if you go back to reality, you’ll be shot. So stay calm!”
I stared at her, unable to speak or move or think. It was all too much.
She sighed. “Just wait here. I’ll get my brother.”
* * *
I was afraid to move after she left.
The mist—or tear gas, I suppose—would clear now and then, and I could see bodies around me. Their clothes and faces were gray, like the rest of the world. Everything was leached of color, except for my own hands and the red blood I’d wiped away from my eyes.
Wherever this was, I didn’t belong here. I was too alive.
It was long minutes of waiting before another shape loomed out of the mist—a boy my age. I could see the resemblance to his sister, except that his skin wasn’t gray like hers. It was as brown as mine at the end of a long summer at the beach, and jet-black hair fell just above his shoulders. He wore a silk shirt that rippled like a dark liquid across his skin.
Even in that awful moment, I could see that he was beautiful. He shone somehow, as if sunlight were breaking through the mist, just for him. He was one of those boys with a perfect jaw, who looks stunning when he’s clean shaven, but just that little bit more handsome with the barest shadow of stubble.
“Don’t be afraid,” he said.
I tried to answer, but my mouth was dry.
“My name is Yamaraj,” he said. “I can help you.”
He had the same accent as his sister—from India, I thought, with a touch of England. His words came out precisely, like someone who’d learned English in a classroom.
“I’m Lizzie,” I managed.
He looked puzzled a moment. “Short for Elizabeth?”
I just stared at him. It was such a strange thing to say.
Something flashed in the corner of my eye—another man, running fast, ducking and weaving as he went. He wore a gas mask, a black uniform, and a bulletproof vest. He must have been one of the good guys, but at that moment he looked like a monster.
Yamaraj put his hand on my arm. “This is almost over. I’ll take you someplace safe.”
“Please,” I said as he turned me away from the muted roar of gunfire.
But then I saw what was ahead of us—the metal gate that had doomed us all. A dozen bodies lay at its foot, still and silent. One woman had her arm flung across a child. Another man’s fingers were bloody from clawing at the unyielding steel.
I froze. “This is where they caught us!”
“Close your eyes, Elizabeth.” His voice had a quiet intensity that forced me to obey, and he led me gently forward. “Don’t worry,” he kept saying. “The overworld can’t hurt you if you stay calm.”
I wasn’t calm at all. But my panic was like a poisonous snake at a zoo, staring at me from the other side of thick glass. Only Yamaraj’s touch on my arm kept the glass from shattering. His skin seemed to burn against mine.
With every blind step forward I expected to feel a body underfoot, or to slip on blood, but there was only a slight tugging on my clothes, as if we were walking through brambles.
“We’re safe now,” Yamaraj finally said, and I opened my eyes again.
We were in another part of the airport, where rows of plastic chairs faced the sealed-up doors of boarding gates. Televisions were mounted on the walls, their screens blank. Sliding walkways moved between glass barriers, empty.
The light was just as hard and cold here, and everything still gray, except for Yamaraj, shining and brown. But the tear gas was only wisps and haze around us.
I turned to stare back the way we’d come. The gate was in the distance, the fallen bodies on the other side.
“We walked through that?” I asked.
“Don’t look back. It’s important that you stay—”
“Calm. I get it!” Nothing makes me more annoyed than someone telling me to stay calm. But the fact that I could snap at him meant that I was coming out of shock.
My anger sputtered when I turned to face Yamaraj. His gaze was so steady, and the glint in his brown eyes softened the hard light around us. He was the only thing in this world that wasn’t gray and cold.
“You’re still bleeding.” He grasped the tail of his shirt with both hands, and with a sharp movement ripped a piece away. When he pressed it against my forehead, I could feel the warmth of his hand through the silk.
My mind steadied a little. The dead don’t bleed. I wasn’t dead.
“That girl who found me, she’s your sister?”
“Yes. Her name is Yami.”
“She said some weird stuff.”
A smile touched his lips. “Yami is unhelpful sometimes. You must have questions.”
I had a hundred, but they all boiled down to one.
“What’s happening?”
Yamaraj looked past me. “A war, perhaps?”
I frowned. This boy wasn’t from around here. “Um, this isn’t a war. It’s some kind of terrorist attack. But what I meant was . . . I’m not dead, am I?”
His eyes met mine. “You’re alive, Lizzie. Just hurt and scared.”
“But those other people, they shot them all.”
He nodded. “You’re the only one left. I’m sorry.”
I pulled away from him, stumbling a few steps back and sinking into one of the plastic chairs.
“Were you traveling with someone?” he asked softly.
I shook my head, thinking how my best friend Jamie had almost come to New York with me. She might have been lying there with the rest. . . .
Yamaraj settled on the arm of the chair next to mine, pressing the torn piece of shirt against my forehead again. My sanity was clinging to the simple fact that someone was taking care of me.
My hand clasped his.
“Do you remember what happened?” he asked softly. “How you crossed over?”
“We tried to run away.” My voice faltered, and it took a few slow breaths to continue. “But the gate was locked, and one of those men was coming toward us, shooting everyone. I called 911, and the woman on the phone said I should play dead.”